Friday, August 22, 2008
They beat the odds with big lottery wins
Have you heard?
JoAnne Poindexter
Click the button above to see all of our community coverage, or go straight to your community's homepage with the menu below.
More 'Have you heard?'
- Admiral who broke Navy color barrier honored
- Hidden Valley graduate receives VMI scholarship
- Grant will help keep families intact
- Golfing community chips in with help
- Botetourt grad gets spot in Crowe film
Archive
Some of them play the lottery only periodically. One of them had just won $100, and another was having a bad day. But all of these Roanoke Valley residents recently bought lottery tickets and won thousands of dollars.
Pryor Harvey of Vinton was on his way to work for a general contracting company when he stopped at the Getty Mart at 1115 Main St. in Roanoke for a bottle of water.
Deciding to buy a lottery ticket, Harvey selected the Harley-Davidson scratcher game.
"I went to my truck and scratched the ticket," Harvey told lottery officials. That was when he learned he had won a 2008 Harley-Davidson 105th Anniversary Edition Fat Boy Motorcycle.
"I've always wanted a Harley. I couldn't believe I'd won," said Harvey, who previously rode motorcycles.
Harvey received the keys to his new bike from Arthur Grubb, the Virginia Lottery's Roanoke Valley customer service manager, at Harley-Davidson of Lynchburg on Aug. 13.
The Virginia Lottery offered 10 motorcycles -- eight for scratcher winners and two for winners of second-chance drawings. Five of the bikes remained unclaimed when Harvey picked up his.
Meanwhile, David Greenway of New Castle had just won $100 when he and his wife checked his ticket for the Virginia Lottery's July 30 Cash 5 night drawing.
His wife discovered that the ticket that Greenway purchased at C & M Grocery, 427 Main St. in New Castle, was a $100,000 winner. Greenway used Easy Pick, in which the computer randomly selects the numbers. The winning numbers were 2-12-18-20-25.
"Some you win, some you lose," Greenway said. "Maybe this is our time to win."
The 41-year railroad veteran said he intends to save most of his winnings.
The chances of winning the $100,000 top prize for Cash 5 are 1 in 278,256.
When Genell Via of Roanoke sent her son to buy lottery tickets, she selected the same numbers she always does. She didn't expect her son to return home with a winner for the July 30 "Win For Life" drawing.
Via's ticket matched five of the first six numbers plus the Free Ball number, winning the game's second-highest prize, $52,000. The winning numbers for that drawing were 1, 4, 21, 24, 34, 40 with a Free Ball number of 13.
Via, who is retired, said she plans to invest her winnings from the ticket that was purchased at Kroger, 7223 Williamson Road.
Frank Stanley of Buchanan thought he was having a bad day. He said he had lost some money when it accidentally fell out of his pocket and he was feeling down when he bought a "Platinum 7's" scratcher ticket.
His mood improved after he scratched the ticket and discovered he had won the top prize of $150,000.
"I can't believe this," Stanley recalled thinking. "I'm looking at this and I can't believe it."
Stanley, a truck driver, bought the ticket at GO Oil / Dodge's Store, at 2664 Lee Highway in Troutville.
Thinh Nguyen of Roanoke said he doesn't play lottery games very often. In fact, when he went to Stop In Food at 3911 Melrose Ave., he just asked the clerk for any scratcher ticket. A "Cash Cards" ticket won Nguyen the top prize of $250,000.
Not sure that he was a big winner, Nguyen asked some friends to check the ticket and confirm the ticket's worth Nguyen's ticket is the first Cash Cards ticket to win the top prize of $250,000, which means there are still two top-prize-winning tickets to be scratched.
n n n
Seniors and adults with disabilities and their caretakers can now find human services information and resources on a new Web site, Virginia Easy Access at www.easyaccess.virginia.gov.
The Web site is a project of the Virginia Department for the Aging and is part of the commonwealth's No Wrong Door initiative, which offers individuals a simple, single point of entry for information on long-term support options, applications for benefits and other programs.
It also provides a secure Web-based system to connect state and local public agencies, private organizations and providers, allowing consumer information to be shared in a confidential manner and improving coordination of long-term care services.
Easy Access is also a gateway to VirginiaNavigator, a listing of more than 21,000 programs and services across the commonwealth powered by SeniorNavigator.
